On the Cutting Room Floor
by freshouttaideas
Summary: A collection of odds and ends, oneshots, that couldn't find a home in a story and ended up on the cutting room floor. Completely irrelevant to anything. Do not enter if you're looking for substance. All characters and some O/Cs.
1. Chapter 1 - FRAGO

**Author's Note:** This is a collection of oneshots, unrelated - ideas that have no place in a story, requests, dares, challenges. Just for fun and summer silliness and stretching the writing. All our favorite characters and some O/Cs. I own nothing by F/X or E.L. naturally. This first is for _sorchauna_ and anyone else who slogged through the more depressing stories. If anyone has a request, I'll give it my best shot. Happy Independence Day, Happy Canada Day, Happy Summer Solstice and happy any other reason to party in the sunshine.

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**On the Cutting Room Floor - FRAGO**

Tim stood stiffly, arms crossed. "Fuck you. Forget I asked. You are full of shit if you think I'm going to fall for that. Your dad pawned you to me for a lawnmower repair over a year ago, remember?"

Miljana opened her mouth in mock-horror at the idea. "Papa was drunk and desperately missing his favorite weekend hobby," she responded jabbing a finger at him and giggling. "You took advantage of a moment of weakness. Serbian tradition dictates that you must ask his permission."

"Bullshit."

"Chicken," she dared, started laughing.

Tim huffed and walked past her toward the kitchen to get himself a beer. She was laughing harder and he shoved her out of the way against the wall. She sank to the floor, weak-kneed, gasping.

He came back with a bottle, took a swig and looked down at her. "Yes or no?" he demanded, annoyed. "I'm not asking again."

"Oh my god, you're killing me," she squeaked holding herself tightly.

He rolled his eyes but couldn't stop a grin watching her wriggling. "This offer expires at midnight tonight," he said and kicked at her gently, teasing, and his grin grew into a chuckle then a laugh. It was contagious – every time he'd end up laughing with her. She was impossible and life was so ridiculous. Then he too was holding his sides, sliding to the floor, tears streaming down his cheeks.

"Oh god," she gasped, "I'm dying here." She was now lying on her back wiping at her cheeks with her sleeve. "Oh fuck, that hurts. Oh shit. I love you."

"I love you, too," he stated, serious now. "So, will you marry me or not?"

"Yes," she blurted out, crawling over to him and settling in his arms, "Of course I will. God, what a dumb question." She helped herself to some of his beer.

"You are so fucking annoying," he stated, affection softening the words.

"Annoying? You are so fucking serious!"

"Serious? If I were serious, I'd be down on one knee with a ring."

She sobered up. "You don't have a ring?"

"No! Shit, you'd just laugh at me if I proposed on my knees with a ring. You're laughing at me anyway."

She tried hard to look upset and disappointed but it just wouldn't take. She couldn't bring herself to care enough about a ring. She started laughing again. He made a face.

"Stop it," she gasped, reaching up and pressing her palm against his nose, hiding his expression from view. "It hurts."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," he groaned, talking around her hand. "So, when do you want to get married?" He pushed her arm away and she put it around his neck instead.

A few chuckles escaped, stragglers, as she considered the question. She wiped at her face, quirked an eyebrow. "Are you on call this weekend?"

"Nope."

They shared a look, another dare, a grin, mischief, then broke into hysterics all over again.

And Tim went to work Monday as usual, but married – a residual smile and a hangover from celebrating with Miljana's parents.

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	2. Chapter 2 - Cleared Hot

**Author's Note: **For hallonim, a cheer-up for being stuck inside.

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**On the Cutting Room Floor – Cleared Hot**

"Shit." Raylan spoke aloud what they were all thinking. "We can't let these bull-necked, muscle-bound, cocky, garish-red-truck-driving bastards get the best of us. I am not going to accept defeat here. Can't we just shoot 'em?" He turned to Art with the question.

"No, Raylan, I don't think shooting them is a good idea under the circumstances. It probably wouldn't go over well with the powers-that-be. And it would be a PR nightmare." Art squinted across the field, sizing up the situation. "They've brought in hired guns and it's just too much fire power for us. We'll be lucky to walk out of here with our dignity."

Raylan reached over and picked up his hat, settled it firmly on his head and peered up at the harsh afternoon sun. "I ain't leaving with just my dignity. I want their balls on a platter, Art. I've never been bested before at my own game. We've still got one more go if we can just hold 'em down, give ourselves a shot."

"It gets late early out there," Tim said, nodding wisely.

Art turned on Tim with his frustrations. "Are you hearing yourself? Is the sun getting to you? That makes no sense whatsoever."

"Yogi Berra said it first." Tim turned his cap around, brim up front, spat out the sunflower seed shells he'd been chewing on all afternoon. "Don't get mad at me for it."

Art pressed his mouth shut tightly, one last mental run through his options before giving orders to his Marshals. "Alright, let's do this. We'll hold 'em down if we can, see if we can get an opportunity to even things out. Don't let any of them slip past you. I want 'em out fast." He mulled over an idea, said to Tim, "I'm going to take advantage of your skills, son. Set yourself up on a center line – go for the long shots."

Tim smiled grimly, "I got it covered."

The Marshals knew what was expected of them, what was on the line today and they took their positions determined to see it through. It was do or die. Art walked among them, a nod here, a pat on the back there, encouraging words where needed. He was fully aware that they had no hope of getting out of this one winners – they were facing some big guns, out of state probably – but he kept up the appearance of optimism for his crew.

It wasn't long before the Marshals' defenses were overwhelmed. They were down four and something had to be done to stop the bleeding. Art looked to Tim and gave him the nod, _make it count._ Tim reached around to his back, pulled his Glock, took a line and shot the next ball to leave the bat, a long fly, a sure homerun, knocking it out of the air before it could leave the outfield. It exploded, rubber and leather drifting now without momentum, just gravity tugging gently, and the pieces fell uselessly, littering the field below. The game ended in a brawl.

Art stared woefully at the fists flying, US Marshals and the Lexington Fire Department in an all out dugout-emptying war. He took off his catcher's mask, skirted the melee and slowly ambled to the outfield where Tim was still standing, a grin as wide as the brim on his baseball cap.

"Holy shit! Did you see that?" he called out happily to the Chief, waving his handgun at the baseball debris on the ground around him. "I always wanted to do that."

Art wiped the sweat off his brow with a sleeve, said calmly, "I meant you could run it down, Tim, not shoot it."

"Oh." Tim looked contrite, momentarily. "Oh well. That was a good shot, though, wasn't it?" And the grin stretched wide again.

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	3. Chapter 3 - Alive Day

**Author's Note: **This one is for PamelaLillianIsley, aka Poison Ivy (I had to look up the reference) – a good ending to a bad day for a clinical psychologist.

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**On the Cutting Room Floor – Alive Day**

"Okay," he said, smiling, "I'll humor you."

Miljana felt she'd already won – he was smiling at the end of a shitty day and that was worth something. This day had been looming, a dark cloud at month end, his eyes ticking off the countdown on the calendar, no outward sign, an inward build. It was an 'alive day' for Tim, the anniversary of a particularly brutal firefight and friends had died and he'd come through it. It ached for him and for her now with him.

She hadn't had a great day either. A client, first thing, had yelled at her, angry and hurtful and personal and she found it hard to set her emotions aside, Tim's blocking hers. They were her companions throughout the rest of the morning and afternoon, her hurt feelings, her perceived failures.

Tim would yell on occasion but never at her, always at the world. Even when she was the only one in the room she knew he wasn't yelling at her. He was very careful that way, or maybe not careful so much as aware of her as a person – something in his eyes was always reaching out, speaking to her directly and cutting through the raging. He would yell and then look at her helplessly, as if to say, _I know it's not you. _It was a small thing, but it meant a lot, and now he was humoring her. Sometimes that's all you needed to feel important.

She carried her affection in the sound of her voice when she replied with sarcasm, "You're so kind."

She pushed him down on the floor and he growled and pulled her down with him and pulled off her sock and chewed on her toe.

"Tim," she scolded, laughing, "I thought you wanted a drink."

He pulled off her other sock, "I thought you said I couldn't have one," and massaged her foot, chewed on those toes, too.

"I did not say that." She giggled. "I said you had to earn it."

"But it's Friday. I earned a drink just getting to Friday."

"Humor me."

"Okay," he repeated, "I'll humor you."

She freed her foot from his grasp and got up, came back a minute later with two glasses, a ping pong ball and a bottle of bourbon.

"Here's the deal," she said. "You have to bounce the ball once and get it in my glass. You miss, you have to answer a question. You get it in, I have to drink. Then we switch."

"You sure you want to play this game?"

"You chicken?"

"Shut up."

"You first."

She directed him to the front door and she moved down the hall opposite. He bounced the ping pong ball once off the floor and it landed neatly in her cup. She stared at it, looked up, worry gathering.

"What're you drinking?" he asked, grinning.

"Shit," she replied, "lucky shot." She slid his bourbon down to him and stood up to get herself a bottle of wine.

"Oh, come on. Wine? Wimp."

"Girls can't metabolize alcohol as quickly as guys," she explained. "My turn."

She missed, shoulders slumped.

"What happened today?" Tim asked. "You didn't look yourself when you came in."

She let out a breath in a huff like a two-year-old. "Somebody yelled at me."

"A client?"

"Yeah."

"You want me to kick the shit out of him for you?"

"No! And that's three questions. You're cheating."

He didn't hesitate, bounced the ping pong ball straight into her glass. "Drink up, sweetheart." An evil grin followed.

Miljana narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously, poured herself some wine and drank it. "Why do I get the feeling you've done this before."

"Never play drinking games with a Ranger. We spend a lot of time killing time on base, waiting on orders or weather or some other stupid shit."

Miljana bounced the ball and missed. "I'm out of practice," she whined.

"I'm thirsty," Tim whined back. "You want me to move closer?"

"Fuck off."

"Fine." He chuckled, bounced the ball neatly into her cup again then asked, "What did he yell at you about?"

"I can't tell you."

Tim shrugged. "You picked the game."

She let out a more mature sigh this time, experienced. "He doesn't like to talk and he thinks I'm being mean asking him to." She retrieved the ball and had another mouthful of wine. "Why did you talk to me? You didn't want to."

"I haven't missed. You can't ask me any questions."

She threw, missed again, pouted, so he tossed it back immediately, skipping his turn at a question, purposely hit her and missed the cup.

"I wanted to keep seeing you," he confessed, answering her. "And you know that."

He was rewarded with a grin. "I know," she said, "but it's nice to hear it."

Tim moved his cup this time to catch her throw. "About fucking time." He poured himself a shot and downed it, smacked his lips in appreciation, bounced another effortlessly into her cup.

"Oh for fuck's sake," she complained, drank some more wine. "If you want to get laid tonight you'd better not get me too drunk. It won't be nearly as much fun."

"You want to stop?"

"NO!"

"Better make it harder for me then. I don't want to have to take you to the hospital for alcohol poisoning."

"Look at you all confident."

An hour later Miljana was curled up on the floor laughing, down to her underwear, holding both cups and Tim was bouncing the ping pong balls off the wall and in every time. They'd changed the rules so he could drink whenever she missed and he would have to answer a question to get a kiss, and then he upped the ante and bet on items of clothing to be removed if he could make a shot off the wall or the table and then they had sex on the living room floor and Miljana felt the day melt away in the heat of bourbon and sweat and skin.

"I'm starving," she said later, lying on top of him while he ran his fingers lightly up her back.

"Good thing for you I fixed dinner before you came home and decided to play some stupid drinking game. Move your naked ass and I'll heat it up."

He kissed her, handed her bits of clothing and padded to the kitchen in bare feet and jeans. He slowed briefly at the calendar as he walked past, eyes lingering on the date.

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	4. Chapter 4 - Underneath the Meat Tag

**Author's Note: **So, if you're reading this chapter, consider yourself an honorary guinea pig. A good friend wanted to hear Miljana's POV, also suggested some first-person writing as an exercise. Okay. (Besides, I owe her for the piggy. Her photos always surprise me.) She said I didn't have to post it but it's amazing what people are willing to read when they're supposed to be working…

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**On the Cutting Room Floor – Underneath the Meat Tag**

I walk into Steve's office, no knock. I don't know what he'd do if I knocked. Probably check my temperature. I purposely don't greet him and that's the signal that I'm here as his patient not his friend. He grins anyway but I don't feel like grinning back. I'm disturbed today by something, decide to be a drama queen about it all and flop luxuriously on his couch. He rolls his eyes at my ridiculous display, grabs his notebook, puts himself in character and joins me, over to the chair, one leg crossed over the other at the knee, an elegant pen poised. Ready, he peers over his glasses.

"Tell me about your fadder. Vaz he attentive?"

I narrow my eyes at him, annoyed. "Your German accent sucks."

He pouts.

I cross my arms, play at more annoyed.

"Miljana," he says, patience in a well-cut suit. "What can I do for you today?"

He should be working in Washington not Lexington, hobnobbing with the politicians and diplomats then flirting with their bodyguards. But I'm grateful he's not, that he's teaching here instead.

"I need some advice…NOW!"

Steve raises his eyebrows and I feel like throwing myself at his mercy and telling him what's bothering me. But I don't. Maybe he'll weasel it out of me before the end – he's good that way – but for now I'm too embarrassed at my ridiculous and unprofessional dilemma to confess. Not yet. I feel like a thirteen-year-old. I feel like stomping my feet and yelling about how unfair the world is.

"Advice about what?" he asks.

"About love."

"Oh, stop."

"I'm serious."

He sets down the elegant pen and the notebook, uncrosses his leg and slouches back into his chair. "I thought you were here for a session."

"I am."

"Okay. So you've met someone?"

"Yes." I don't meet his eye and now I'm thoroughly annoyed because he is my mentor and I know that he now knows that I'm hiding something. I come to him whenever it gets to be too much with a client, or if I'm confused on how to proceed. It's all professional talk. Personal shit is left for the bar near the university that he frequents.

"A him or a her?"

"Oh for heaven's sake – a him. You know my preferences are hairy and angular, not curvy."

"So I'd like him then?"

"No. He's not cultured enough for you."

Steve smiles at a memory and I catch it when I look over. "Oh," I tease, "so you've developed a taste for a bit of roughness around the edges, have you? This is new."

He clears his throat, "Ahem, we're discussing you today. This is _my _office."

I sit up and lean forward eagerly. "Tell me about him."

"Miljana, that is clear evasion." He looks surprised, maybe a bit hurt. "You think I'll disapprove of your choice. Why would you think that? Is there something to disapprove of?"

I shrug, regret the gesture immediately. It's evasive, too. He's at the heart of the matter in under ten minutes. I hate him.

"Why don't you just tell me about him? But skip the crap and get on with the most important thing – what makes him different from the others?"

I ignore the jab and smile. "He likes me. I can tell."

"You've got tits and ass and all other feminine attributes in all the right places, girl. Any guy would like you. It's biology."

"No, I mean, he likes _me."_

* * *

I'm back the next day, determined to be more honest with Steve. I need to be, to figure out some things for myself.

It's hard to think clearly when your face flushes and you're tongue-tied and you want to just reach out and touch the man every time he's within reach. I told Steve about him last time I was here but it was a thin portrait at best and Steve knows I'm hiding something. I knew I was in trouble the minute that Marshal walked into my office. I knew. I was half hoping he'd lump me in with the other psychologists from his past that he hates and avoids and dismiss me too. It would've been easier. Instead he makes appointments and keeps appointments and talks to me and laughs at my sarcasm and humor and shoots it back and it's fun and easy to be with him and I don't have to cover up the rough bits that I have on my surface. He's like hard liquor for the soul. And he doesn't even try to cover his rough bits. He's artless. It's endearing.

I worry it's his sadness I'm attracted to but I do the stupidest things to see him grin so I tell myself it's the whole man I want and I don't think I'm lying.

The last time I saw him he told me a story about the war that… I was considering referring him on but I can't bring myself to do it. He worked so hard to get that one story out. It would be cruel, like a betrayal. He trusts me, as far as he can.

This is the stuff I need to be telling Steve. He'd understand. I think.

I'm distracted and I knock.

Steve stares at me for a full minute, feigning shock. I glare back.

"Oh my God," he says, sardonic asshole. "You _are _in love."

* * *

"This is the third time you've stretched out on my couch and spouted a lot of meaningless nonsense." Steve's annoyed this time. I guess he has a right to be. He's not getting paid for this. And I've been avoiding him.

"Meaningless nonsense? That's redundant." I'm resorting to sarcasm. How pathetic.

His look mirrors my assessment.

"How long have you been seeing him?" he asks.

I bolt. Literally.

"Oh shit, I forgot, I have to meet my mother." And I'm out the door.

Later I think, _that was stupid._ It was a harmless question between friends. Steve meant how long have I been dating him, not seeing him as a patient. He doesn't know because I haven't told him. It's just, I've never dated Tim, so I assumed...

* * *

I'm together enough not to knock this time. It's too late for any advice and I know, guilty, that I didn't confess the truth to Steve earlier so I wouldn't have to hear him to say, _"Don't."_ All those lectures in ethics... _Ha, that will never be me._ And now the Marshal's kissed me and I've kissed him back and I've crossed my Rubicon. _Alea iacta est._ Actually, he did more than kiss me. I'm acquiring a taste for bourbon just licking it off his lips.

Never say never. What wise man first uttered those words? He probably fell in love with his best friend's wife…or maybe his goat. I snicker in a very silly way and Steve turns and sees me loitering here at the door with a just-fucked grin.

He tilts his head. "Sex good?"

"Piss off."

He looks hurt again, but I know he's putting it on. "You wouldn't say that to Mister Perfect."

"I would and I do and he's not perfect…just perfect for me."

Steve sighs deeply. I foolishly assume that he's happy for me.

"Miljana, how long has he been your client?"

_Oh shit. _The question stops me cold. "How did you know?"

He shakes his head, mocking me and I deserve it.

"Silly girl. I've known from the start. You told me about him here. It had to be a work problem." He smiles. "It wouldn't be the first time it's happened – it's a professional hazard." He walks over to me and I'm still in shock. "Shall we go for a drink?"

I nod. I'm such an idiot.

He talks about university politics on the way over to his bar, leads me to a table in a corner.

"He's the Marshal?"

I nod again, unusually quiet.

"He's seeing you about job related issues?"

The waiter comes by, Steve orders a scotch and I order a Stinger – it seems appropriate.

And here's the stinger: "He's an Afghanistan veteran."

Steve stops the waiter from leaving, calmly holds up two fingers. "Make mine a double."

* * *

I see Steve once a month now in his office and mostly we talk about Tim. He's been very understanding and patient and a level-headed grounding wire. I think I've convinced him – or actually it's Tim that's convinced him – that I'm in no danger. Tim would never be abusive, not to me. To himself maybe, and maybe that's why Steve still looks worried sometimes. They've become friends. It was unkind of me to think they wouldn't. Steve reminds me that I'm an excellent judge of character and I'm happy to see him teasing Tim the way he teases me and Tim just laughs and deals it out in turn.

He shows up at the house for Tim's birthday with a ridiculously priced, hard-to-find, small-batch bottle of single-barrel bourbon. Bastard – he's usurped my evening. Tim has converted Steve to his species of whiskey and the three of us toast the day and then the two of them get toasted. They drink way more than me. Steve doesn't handle his liquor as well as Tim and he rips into a risqué story about one of his lovers and Tim, he just sits there, a bemused smile and some well-placed sarcasm and surprisingly accepting, and then we're all laughing.

God I love him. Does nothing surprise him? He's so contained, all the time looking at the world with the jaded expectation that it could only fail at any attempt to shock him or please him or hurt him or scare him. Once in a while though there's a crack, like when I get him laughing and he looks so grateful it moves me, profoundly. Or those times at night when he wakes me up and the fear is right there for me to see and it takes him a moment to come back from wherever he is and cover it again.

I'm starting to see patterns in the bits and pieces that Tim leaves around, a word, an empty look, an empty bottle. Sometimes a whole scene plays out when he opens up about something or rips into the furniture. Sometimes I can prepare; sometimes I clear out of the way; sometimes I can only soothe. He always comes back to himself though. Always. But one day, what if he doesn't? I can't help him from this distance; I need to be further away and I can't ever do that again, sit at a distance. It's too late for that.

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	5. Chapter 5 - The Wizard

**Author's Note: **And then she asks for a Tim POV – so demanding! (But the pig's worth it.)

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**On the Cutting Room Floor – The Wizard**

Jesus fucking Christ, does she have to do that?

I'm a bad boy. I buy her those coffees with the caramel on top just to see her swipe her finger through it and then lick it off. It's fucking torture. I want to lick it off for her. Jesus, I'd do anything to lick that finger. I'd do anything – I'm even talking to her about shit I don't ever talk about. I'm such an asshole and she's just trying to help me out.

I can't do the office thing. I try. I think I'm driving her crazy. I can't sit still in there. After two sessions of me pacing the room and saying nothing she suggests a walk. So we walk. I'm her last client and we walk longer than the hour and she asks me some stuff and I come up with more one-word answers than she probably thought existed in the English language – may have stretched the grammar rules a bit doing it.

"Knock, knock," she says finally when we're back at the curb by my truck.

I play along. "Who's there?"

"Interrupting cow." She grins, all ready to laugh at her own joke.

"Interrupting c…"

"MOO!"

And then she starts laughing and I just stare at her. I'm never quite sure about her. I'm beginning to think she's the one that needs therapy.

"I love that one," she says when she's stopped giggling finally. "My neighbor's kid told me that one yesterday."

And she starts up again, laughing, thinking about it all over, I guess. It makes me smile, watching her laughing.

xxx

"Tim," she says, twists her mouth up the way she does when she knows she's going to say something I don't like, "I know you started to see me about that situation at work but I think it might be a good thing if you talk to me a bit about your time in the military."

Even I catch the shift this time, I guess I've been at it enough and it's getting almost laughable it's so obvious. My leg starts jumping and I find it hard to look at her. I'm a pretty good poker player – did a lot of that with the guys in the barracks and I can keep a straight face when I have a bust hand – but I can't hide my tells in these sessions. There's more at stake in emptying your soul than there is in emptying your wallet. I haven't got the nerves for this game.

She takes pity on me, opens with a light bet, one I can call comfortably. "Tell me what you liked best about it. There must have been something to keep you in the Army past your contract obligation."

I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind, relieved at having something easy to talk about. "The rifle."

"I beg your pardon."

"I like shooting. Making a good shot is…well, it's the best." I'm embarrassed, rub an imaginary bit of dirt off my hand.

"You were good at it?"

I look at her then, want to make something clear. It's important. "I still am."

"Then why did you leave?"

How did she corner me? "It was time."

"How did you know it was time?"

"It was time, okay. Believe me – _you know."_ I'm angry and I leave her sitting there, decide I've had enough therapy to last me a while.

She shows up at my door the next day. It's the first time I've seen her with one of those coffees. She's licking her finger and I let her in, hypnotized. I'm such a fucking guy.

xxx

I still don't like to talk about it but I can't stop myself buying those coffees and meeting her for our sessions and damn that finger. I'm starting to wonder if she does it on purpose, like maybe she caught me watching once and now throws it out there at the beginning of each hour like the girls in the beer ads who are just there to get your attention while the message gets delivered. Let me tell you, it works.

I arrive today like a trained monkey with her coffee.

"Thanks," she says, takes it from me and pulls the lid off and swipes her finger through the foam and the caramel and licks it off. Fuck. I'm dying here.

"What are you drinking?" she asks. Earth to Tim.

"Uh, just black coffee. They make good coffee at this place."

"Was the coffee good in Afghanistan? I hear they drink it strong there."

"No, actually, the locals drink tea."

"Really? Is it good?"

"Better than the base coffee." I grin, remembering. "That stuff was shit. When we were at the base in Kandahar, we'd go to the Tim Horton's with the Canadians. It was marginally better. But normally it was shit army coffee." I shrug it off. "I'd drink it anyway. You'd need a good hit of caffeine working on so little sleep."

"Did you find it hard to sleep while you were there?"

"No, I can sleep anywhere. There was just no time. We'd sometimes run two patrols in 24-hours. A lot at night. By the end of a deployment, even a short one, you'd be a fucking zombie, running on bad coffee and adrenalin. I remember shipping home one time and sleeping the whole way. Out cold before takeoff and someone had to shake me awake after we'd landed and taxied off the runway. I'm good at sleeping on planes now." I grin for her.

She grins back. Her eyes are really blue. "Did you punch the poor guy who had to wake you? I know you startle easily when you wake up unexpectedly."

I think back to that plane, that deployment, the face that woke me up. I can feel the grin falling, and if I can feel it then she can see it and I try to hitch it back up but it's too late. It's down in a hole now with the face that woke me up. I'm upset. I hate that word – upset. It sounds so fucking weak. I haven't thought about my buddy in a while though. I don't want to think about him or that deployment or the one after. I slept hard on that plane. I can feel how tired I was even now.

"You should try one of these caramel coffees," she says. "Here." She dips her finger in the foam and touches my lips. Earth to Tim.

xxx

She arrives at the door with a pound of some fancy-ass boutique coffee in a plain brown paper bag with an ink stamp on it that says 'fair-trade', announcing to the world with its inconspicuous packaging how conspicuously snobby it is and politically correct and saying, _look at me I'm helping some poor fucking farmer in some fucked up third world country, _and…and shit it smells good. It's Saturday morning, and shit she looks good without any make-up, inconspicuously conspicuous, just like that awesome smelling coffee, only she smells better.

"I have a confession," she says, "I hate caramel coffee. Could you make me a pot and I'll take it black?"

I'm exhausted. I don't tell her but she woke me up. It's been a week of overtime and I fell asleep on the couch when I got in last night at four in the fucking morning. But I make her coffee and we sit on the porch and she says, _tell me about the soldier that woke you up,_ and I do. I have no idea why. I had no idea it still hurt that much. Fuck. It's all I can do to hold it together. After she leaves I run until I can't breathe, so hard I throw up, then home and I fall asleep again on the couch and wake up two hours later, shouting and shaking and angry.

I don't want to see her again. I don't want to do this.

xxx

She puts herself in my way though. The next time I see her she's sitting on my porch and I can't avoid her and I really don't want to anyway. It's after work and it feels different and she's so close to me in the kitchen and we end up in bed and I get to lick that finger and she laughs when I do 'cause she knew all along, and then I forget the world and everything in it for a while and when I wake up in the middle of the night, she's still there. How does one person so fucking upend your world? Jesus fucking Christ, does she have to do that?

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	6. Chapter 6 - Dead-Check

**Author's Note: **This is a deleted scene from 'Act of Mercy' – didn't make the final cut. An early Tim and Rachel moment for _sorchauna._

* * *

**On the Cutting Room Floor – Dead-Check**

"What'd I miss?" Tim asked, walking up next to Art in a huddle with some locals.

Art turned around. "Nice of you to show up finally. We raided the place on a tip. Pig farm. All kinds of shit happened, excuse the pun. Full-out western showdown." He looked Tim over. "How was court? Still breathing, I see, but I can tell by the twitching that Reardon was presiding."

Not even six months on the job and Tim figured he'd seen it all working at the Lexington office, almost every situation that the instructors at Glynco had promised them they might have to deal with including a first stint in court all by his lonesome that morning. He understood why Rachel hated court appearances so much. The lawyers had a knack for making even the most competent witness feel like an idiot or an asshole on the stand, or both. He despised the entire process. And to add insult to injury, he'd missed a raid. The raids were fun for him, a dip back in the dangerous waters of wartime madness. The disappointment must have shown on his face because Art acknowledged it in his next comment.

"Aw, muffin, you missed the party. You look sad."

Tim was getting used to his boss. It had taken a while. He cocked his head, responded in kind, "Chief, if you call this a party, then I partied my way through college. I got a fucking PhD in partying."

Art started a grin then stopped it when he caught the bitter undercurrent. Tim was the only Marshal on his staff that didn't go to college. He had a different sort of education – more hands-on. But if he'd learned one thing about his new deputy it was not to pussy-foot around the topic. He pointed vaguely in the direction of an old barn, said, "Rachel's running a class in identifying body parts. Go help her."

"Oh, great. You know I used to run a practical in that subject." Tim spoke carelessly as he stepped around his boss and headed onto the property. "I was so good at it, they offered me an honorary doctorate in Bits and Pieces."

"Thank you, Dr. Tim, for volunteering to help even though you're so over-qualified," Art called after him, watching him walk away. "Around back." He turned to the locals leaning in curiously to listen to the conversation, and said, "Kids these days – too much time playing those violent video games."

Everyone grinned except the man who knew better.

* * *

Rachel was knee-deep in muddy rancid water, wading through a ditch and the remains of a week's worth of spring rain. She shuffled along slowly, dragging her feet, then stopped, closed her eyes briefly, opened them and looked heavenward. She sighed, long and loud, reached down with a gloved hand and felt blindly around her boots, fishing for something. She closed her eyes again as she straightened back up, a severed foot in one hand, tossed it onto the drier high ground where a woman from the coroner's office was helping collect the bits and pieces.

"You okay?" the woman asked her.

"Oh, yeah," Rachel replied, looked over at her and smiled. "Thanks for asking."

"Did I miss lunch?" A voice called out, all chipper and casual and clearly unaffected by the carnage.

She turned to see Tim strolling toward her, hands jammed in his pockets, an amused smirk. _ "They will go through bone like butter." _His attempt at a British accent sounded silly mixed with the Kentucky. _"You need at least sixteen pigs to finish the job in one sitting, so be wary of any man who keeps a_ _pig farm_."

"What?" Rachel was not predisposed to appreciate Tim's humor at this point. It was well past noon and if she had been hungry earlier, her stomach had given up hope and was complaining about other things right now.

Tim, for his part, was just happy to be outside. "You never saw _Snatch?"_

"What?" she repeated, more churlish the second time.

"Brick Top?" Tim looked at her, arms out, hoping for an encouraging warm glow of recognition so he could continue the lines. After a moment of freezing temperatures from her, he gave up. "You gotta see it. Brick Top - one of the best movie bad guys _ever."_

The coroner joined in, "Oh, he was great. Old guy with the glasses, the one in the movie with Brad Pitt."

"Yeah," Tim grinned for her.

Rachel had already tuned him out and was slogging forward through the ditch. The wind shifted and carried to her gently the aromas from the pig barn. She groaned, "God, I need a shower."

"Was that an invitation?" Tim teased. He waded in to help her, pulling a pair of latex gloves out of his pocket.

"Don't make me shoot you, Tim. I'm not in the mood."

"Not in the mood for what? For shooting me or being harassed or…?"

"Shut up."

He tried to, for a second, gave up and continued playfully, "So what pieces are we missing?"

"Does it matter?" Rachel huffed.

"Well, I'd like to know which ones to keep and which ones to throw back," Tim replied, thickening the drawl.

The coroner laughed, even if Rachel didn't, and answered Tim's question. "We've got most of one body without a head, but three feet." She shrugged. "I'm not sure I've put him together right."

"Maybe it's an experimental mutant farm." Tim suggested, hushed voice. "Have either of you had a close look at the pigs yet?"

"Maybe you'd like to shut up and help me?" Rachel snapped.

Tim leveled out his grin and patted Rachel on the shoulder. "Hey, take a break. I'll finish up if you want," he offered.

She sagged a little. "Doesn't this bother you?"

"They're not friends of mine." He waved vaguely up and down the ditch. "Who are they anyway?"

"The victims of a hostile take-over. Dixie Mafia is moving in here." She pointed to the foot she'd just found. "I have a suspicion that the guy with three feet is my fugitive. He's wanted in connection with a murder in Louisiana."

"So there you go. Why should it bother me? Besides, he's dead. No way being upset's gonna help him."

She gave him a look of disbelief and he pretended to misunderstand.

"You don't believe me?" he said. "I'll kick the body if you want me to but I can pretty much tell from here – he's dead."

"I'd have to agree with him," the coroner added. "In my professional opinion, he's dead." She looked down nodding at the human jigsaw puzzle.

Rachel wiped her forehead with a dry part of her sleeve – not even a grimace for their efforts to humor her.

"Look, why don't you climb out and dry off," Tim said. "I got a thermos of coffee in the front seat of the truck. Help yourself."

She looked like she wanted to argue but changed her mind and took a step toward the edge of the ditch, caught her foot on something and slipped. Tim reached out and grabbed her to stop her going down and they both stumbled precariously before regaining their footing.

Rachel let out an angry scream. "Shit! Fuck! I hate this!"

"Rachel, are you okay?" Tim looked worried.

"No!" She reached down again and came back up holding a head by the hair. "Oh, God."

A smirk snuck onto Tim's face, quelled quickly when she glared at him, then it reappeared, growing out of control. "You look medieval. Like some evil fantasy warrior princess."

"This isn't funny, Tim. You're…" Her phone rang. "Oh, come on," she huffed. It persisted.

"You gonna answer that?" He asked, gesturing to her pocket.

She huffed again and held out a hand. Tim pulled off her glove and she pulled out her phone, checked the display, screwed up her face in frustration, answered, "Ma?"

Tim began laughing and the coroner joined in.

"Ma, this is a bad time. I'm going to have to call you b…" She paused to listen. "You have to speak louder. I can't hear you."

Rachel waved her grisly catch impatiently at her companions, demanding quiet, but without the banter other sounds began to intrude. The moisture still dripping from the head onto the fetid surface of the water and the distant grunting of pigs seemed to amplify unnaturally, stirring a fresh round of giggles and snorts from Tim and the coroner.

"Ma, I really can't talk right now."

Rachel mouthed obscenities and looked desperately to Tim for help. He pointed at the head, gestured for her to hand it over. "You want me to take that?" he whispered.

She threw the phone at him, angry.

Tim caught it gamely, held it up to his ear. "Mrs. Brooks?" A pause while he tried to school his features into proper seriousness then he gave up and shared the mirth with a grin for Rachel. "Yeah, it's me, Tim. Yeah, look, sorry, uh, but Rachel is up to her eyes in it at the moment."

At that comment Rachel lifted the head to eye level and shook it, losing herself to the insanity. Tim sniggered.

"No, no, she's fine." A pause. "Yeah, I'm good." Another pause. "Yes ma'am, I'm eating better, but I'm all out of your leftovers," he hinted. "Sunday? This Sunday? Sure, I'd love to… No, I don't have any plans… No ma'am, I won't be missing anything important. I mean I'm gonna have to cancel a date with the entire collection of Victoria's Secret models to be there, but it's worth it for one of your dinners."

"Hey!"

Tim spun around.

"Is this really the time for personal calls?" Art marched over, reached out, snatched the phone away and barked at it, words soaked in sarcasm, "Excuse me for interrupting this obviously very important phone call but Tim is _working_ right now. Why don't you call back later?" Then his eyes opened in horror. He stood at attention and sent a frantic look to Rachel. "Mrs. Brooks? What a nice surprise. And how are you today?"

"Uh-oh," Tim whispered, slogged his way through the water past Rachel and out of ear shot.

Rachel tossed the head next to the coroner, climbed wearily out of the ditch and headed for Tim's truck, Art puffing after her – "Yes ma'am, why she's the backbone of this office" – trying to give the phone back.

Tim took another sliding step through the water, reached down and pulled up an arm.

"Give me a hand, will you?" he said, grinned ridiculously and waved the spare at the coroner when she turned around to help, the giggles drowning out the horrors.

* * *

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	7. Chapter 7 - BOHICA

**Author's Note:** For a request from Shukumei4U – some Marshal light – like a Bud Light only different.

* * *

**On the Cutting Room Floor - BOHICA**

"Nelson, give me the fucking hat."

"No way, Tim. Raylan'll kill me. He told me he'd knock some teeth out if anything happened to it."

"And I'll shoot you if you don't hand it over. Which sounds worse to you? Now come on, give it to me. You can tell him I took it from you at gun point." Tim turned to look behind him, making sure no one was watching. He held his hand out toward the other Marshal, gimme-gimme with his fingers.

"No," Nelson stood his ground.

"After what Raylan did to you? Come on, man. A little payback's in order here."

Nelson looked like he was in pain but he passed the hat to Tim. "Okay."

"Okay. Now, this is what we're going to do." Tim leaned in, conspiracy in the making.

Nelson backed away. "Uh-uh. I am not helping you with whatever you're doing. I'm in enough trouble."

"Alright then. I guess I'll have to tell Art what really happened that day that you and that prost…"

"Okay, okay. Crap, I hate this office."

* * *

"You're not serious! This is my hat?" Raylan gaped at the remains sitting sadly on his desk, charred, just the brim left like a suede toilet seat that someone had their last smoke on, fell asleep and died. "Nelson, what did you do? I told you to look after it. I warned you what would happen if... That was my hat!"

"Now, Raylan," Tim stood up from his desk. "Nothing Nelson could've done about it. The explosion…" Tim made a sound like a bomb going off and gave Raylan a visual by throwing his hands out. "Man, it was intense."

"But you were all well back. Art told me. You were behind the car." Raylan pleaded for an explanation for his tragedy.

Nelson played along, nervous. "It was the blast," he offered.

Raylan gave him an incredulous look. "The blast blew my hat _toward_ the fire?"

Behind Raylan, Tim rolled his eyes at Nelson. _What the fuck?_ he mouthed then covered for him. "No, it was the backdraft, Raylan. With an explosion that large the fire instantaneously incinerates the air molecules and the surrounding gases get sucked back in to fill the void." He gestured at the burnt offerings. "Hat, flames, you get the picture. I had to hold Nelson back from running after it. The heat from that fire. Shit, man."

Raylan looked crushed. "I told you to hold onto it, Nelson. Jesus – that was my favorite hat. I can't replace it."

"It's not Nelson's fault if his head's not as fat as yours," said Tim, settling himself back at his desk. "It was loose on him."

"Yeah, it was loose," Nelson agreed. "It fell off a couple of times out there with all the action." He scurried back to his seat when he saw Art walk into the bullpen from the elevators with Rachel.

"Job well done, everyone. We've got Drew squared a…" Art was stopped by the look on Raylan's face. "Raylan? Everything alright?"

Raylan just shook his head, looked back to his desk. No one noticed Tim, trying desperately not to laugh, or Nelson, wiping the sweat from his forehead.

"Winona? Is she…"

Raylan looked up, "She's fine, Art. It's just my hat." He picked it up gently, held it out for inspection, what was left.

Art stared a moment, said, "Looks like a portal to hell." Then he chuckled.

"Art," Raylan responded, hurt, "it's not funny."

"Oh shit, Raylan. Sure it is. You should see the look on your face. Tim!" he barked then looked over to see the younger Marshal slouched down in his chair, hand over his face. "Give Raylan his hat back. I got to suspend him today. Be nice."

Tim sat up, rolled his eyes, grumbled, "Killjoy."

"I'll deal with you later; Raylan, in my office."

"I knew it," Raylan shot at Tim.

"Did not. Nelson had you completely fooled."

"Did not."

"Did too."

"I want that hat on my desk before I get back," Raylan snarled as he walked past.

"Oh look, it's after five," Tim called out, smirking. "Quittin' time. Gotta go."

"Tim, I mean it." A threatening finger, an evil look.

Tim grabbed his keys and sprinted for the door.

* * *

"Who's gonna deliver these papers for me?" Art demanded. "Didn't you say you'd do it, Raylan?"

"I got court this morning, Art. Ask Tim."

"You do not," Tim snarled. "You were there yesterday."

"Do too. It dragged on. You know how it goes."

Tim leveled a look, calling out the lie.

"Give it to Tim, Art," Raylan continued, holding down a smirk. "He told me just a minute ago he was bored, wanted out of the office."

"I said I was bored listening to you talking on about gooey baby stories ever since you got back. If I hear one more description of a dirty diaper, I may lose it and start shooting up the office." He turned to Art. "Boss, make him stop."

"I can't make Raylan do anything," Art replied, "and you know that. But I got a temporary solution for you. Deliver these papers." He threw the folder on Tim's desk, turned and mumbled angrily on his way back to his office. "And I thought teenage girls were bad. Retirement's looking kinda nice, you know? Maybe I'll move to Alaska."

Tim swiped the folder up and stormed out. "Asshole," he grumped, not that he was angry really. He was fed up with making phone calls and scrolling through databases. A drive would be nice. He opened the folder in the elevator, checking the address – Corbin – a long enough journey to warrant a coffee stop and maybe lunch at that quiet little diner in London, the one with the awesome milkshakes.

There was construction on the interstate and a lengthy detour, an accident in the main intersection in Corbin and by the time Tim found the address his patience was ebbing and he was thinking lunch might be drive-through instead. He ran up the steps to the shitty two-storey and knocked loudly.

Dewey Crowe answered. They stared at each other in horror then Dewey turned and ran. Tim chased him around back and tackled him in the dirt, cuffed him and hauled him up.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Tim demanded. "And where's Philip Cranston?"

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Dewey responded, whining and puffing out his chest. "This is harassment. I ain't done nothing. I'm working a regular job and this is my mama's house and you'd better hope she doesn't come home anytime soon."

"Or what?" Tim tried to imagine what she could do him.

"Oh, she's mean," Dewey threatened.

"Uh-huh." Tim was half listening, half forming a suspicion. "You don't know anyone named Philip Cranston, do you?"

"I don't know anyone named Philip, period."

Tim hauled Dewey over to a listing picnic table in the scratched dirt lawn and plunked him on it. "You got a job?" he said.

"Yeah. A regular one, too. Mama set it up for me. I'm sweeping at the hairdresser. They do tattoos and all. It's one of those everything beauty places – piercings, fancy toe nails. I got a new tattoo. You want to see it?"

"No." Tim unlocked the cuffs, still working on his suspicions.

Dewey prattled on, hoping to distract the Marshal from the pot plants growing in the back windows. "Sometimes on my break I sit and watch the tattoo girl working on clients. Last week, this one chick wanted one done on her back and she had to take her bra off and everything. I couldn't see nothing though 'cause she was lying on her front on account of the tattoo going on her back."

Tim rubbed a hand through his hair, narrowed his eyes. "Fuckin' Raylan." He started walking toward the SUV. "So this is how he wants to play. Okay."

"Hey," Dewey called out, standing up and following behind him. "Is this harassment?"

"Not yet," Tim snapped over his shoulder. "Take one more step though and it will be."

"Asshole," Dewey yelled but stopped where he was. "You been hanging out with Raylan Givens too long."

* * *

Rachel pushed through the doors into the bullpen as Tim opened them from the other side. She stumbled when the doors gave way without effort and collided with the younger Marshal. He was laughing.

"You're trying to kill me and you think that's funny?" she said.

"Oh, I'm not laughing at you." He tipped his head back toward Art's office.

Rachel peered around him, took it all in – Art, Raylan and Judge Reardon in a closed-door conversation. Reardon didn't look happy.

"What happened?"

"Uh, well, Raylan walked in on Reardon getting a rub and tug at a massage parlor in the west end."

"How? Why?"

Tim shrugged. "Anonymous tip about a fugitive he's been chasing." He shook his head, mock-sympathy. "Poor bastard. How was he to know it was Reardon's regular Thursday haunt?"

Rachel pressed her lips tight in disapproval. "More to the point, how did _you_ know?"

He pressed a hand against his chest, all innocence. "Me? I don't know what you're talking about."

They both turned at the sound of Reardon's voice carrying more clearly, Art's door now open, "…ever again! Do I make myself clear?"

"Gotta go," Tim whispered, hightailed it for the stairs.

Rachel held the door for the steaming Judge.

* * *

Raylan held the door for Tim. Tim glared at him as he passed, covered head to toe in fluorescent pink paint spots.

"This was a new shirt, Raylan," Tim said through his teeth. "You do realize, this means war."

Raylan raised a finger and an eyebrow. "I thought we were already in a war. Maybe you could explain to me the difference since I'm clearly confused and you're the expert."

"What if I'd shot one of those kids? I can't believe you purposely led me into a paintball game."

"Now, Tim," Raylan replied reasonably, "I wasn't leading. And anyway, I have faith in your ability to discern the difference between a paintball gun and the real thing."

"You're just damn lucky I have good eyesight!"

"If you're eyesight is so good then how come you didn't notice all the pink and yellow decorating the woods?"

"Boys." Something in the tone and the posture, serious, quiet, flying just under the radar of a full-out fury, stopped Raylan and Tim in their tracks. Rachel didn't even comment on the color additions to Tim's clothes. She was seething.

"Rachel," Raylan soothed, silky voice, charmer's smile.

Tim just stared, worry straightening his back.

"While you were out playing one-up, the office got a call. There was no one here to take it but Art and Nelson. Nelson's okay."

Raylan straightened, too. "Art?" he asked, head turning to the empty office.

"He's at the hospital," said Rachel.

"Shit."

"He'll be okay, but I suggest some mighty creative ass-kissing. Maybe a visit and a card?"

"Shit," Tim echoed.

* * *

A quick trip to the Liquor Barn and Tim and Raylan were standing sheepishly at the hospital trying to find someone to ask for help finding Art.

"I told you we'd never find a bottle of Old Pappy in Lexington."

"Well shit, Tim, I had to ask. Bookers'll do. Art likes it straight and it's a good batch."

"We probably should've bought two bottles and a strip-o-gram."

"Bet Reardon would know where to get one of those."

Tim snorted.

Raylan chuckled. "How did you find out about him and his Thursday massages anyway?"

"Emily, one of the court reporters, told me."

"What'd it cost you?"

"I'm not giving up my sources to you. Remember what happened last time."

"Suit yourself."

They wandered a few hallways, peering into rooms, decided to head back to reception.

"It's just a hat." The comment came out of nowhere – Tim, grumpy, feeling guilty.

"It's not _just a hat,_" Raylan snapped, reaching up to touch it fondly. "It's my lucky hat. I'm gonna be buried in it."

"Not so lucky, then."

"You know what I meant."

"You want me to hurry that along for you?"

"Gentlemen?" Art's voice.

They turned to see the Chief, in hospital gown and socks, shuffling down the hall in the company of a nurse.

"Art, Jesus, look we're really sorry." Raylan held out the bourbon.

"What are you two doing here? Did something happen?" Art looked uncomfortable, a bit pale, and now confused, too. "What happened?" He scowled at them. "What did you do?"

Raylan and Tim exchanged a glance.

Art snarled, "Look, I haven't got time for this right now. I'm going for a colonoscopy and you can imagine how good a mood that puts me in – the thought of a camera shoved up my ass. I'll deal with you two when I get back to the office."

Raylan went to pull the gift back but Art was faster, grabbed it, clutched it tightly. "Paying it forward," he snapped then followed the nurse into a room, the gown gaping at the back.

"Oh shit," Tim turned away quickly covering his eyes. "I looked."

But Raylan wasn't paying any attention. "Rachel," he growled, staring into the distance. "Oh, that's mean. So this is how she wants to play."

"I can't believe she did this to us," Tim said, looking hurt.

Raylan narrowed his eyes. "This means war."

* * *

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	8. Chapter 8 - A Bone Budget

**Author's Note:** This is a created deleted scene - so not really a deleted scene at all. It's a request though and how could I say no to anyone who slogged through my really depressing story _…and Nothing Shall by Any Means Hurt You._ I followed Tim around in that one but you'd better believe that his friends were talking about him when he wasn't in the room. This oneshot is more about Art than Tim, takes place the day after Tim goes to shoot off his frustrations at Fischer's (Abe's) range, when he's out with Rachel, somewhere in the middle of Chapter 15 – a conversation between Art and Miljana. (And I'm probably leaving you with more questions than answers again…)

* * *

**On the Cutting Room Floor – A Bone Budget**

Art adjusted his glasses, peered down at the budget numbers and tried to convince himself that it was important for him to review them carefully, like it was important for him to review carefully the limited office resources when prioritizing them against the unlimited number of cases needing the US Marshals Services' expertise, or like it was important for him to review carefully the overtime hours worked or the personal well-being of the very human product which he had to manage daily.

Raylan was running blindly into fatherhood and serving out a thirty-day suspension, Rachel was more distant and surly, Nelson was currently doubting every call he had to make on the job and honestly so was everyone else, Garcia had just announced that she was pregnant again, and Tim was perched on a razor's edge and it was impossible to predict which way he'd fall and whether he'd get hurt in the process. And each of them was licensed to carry a concealed weapon. It was hard to concentrate, hard to focus any energy on the underwhelmingly important questions of how much paper the office would need over the next year, how much to allocate for office furniture, pens, note pads, gas mileage and ammunition, and how much medical leave might be required – his best guess, please – and all within budget.

Fuck the budget. Shit happens. He took off his glasses and tossed them onto the papers, sat back and rubbed his head and tried to come up with something to do with his time today to make him feel like he was accomplishing something, something important enough to justify procrastinating doing his annual budget.

He let his eyes drift around the bullpen. It was unusually empty today – an early lunch or two, everyone else out doing business, a techie upgrading software and the office administrator at her desk. What to do?

The administrator looked up quickly, something distracting her, and the movement caught Art's eye and he followed her gaze to the double doors of the office. A young woman was peering inside, trying to be unobtrusive. Art recognized her, smiled and frowned in quick succession, stood up and ambled over. She saw him coming, acknowledged him with a friendly look that said _caught me_, but remained stubbornly out in the hall on her side of the invisible civilian barrier and waited until he opened the door.

"Dr. Cajic," Art greeted her, "how lovely to see you on this fine day. Whatever brings you up to our humble office?"

"Lunch," Miljana replied, grinning at his obsequious overtures, the over-formal use of her title. She looked wistfully at Tim's empty desk. "I had a free couple of hours."

"Why, how kind of you to ask. I'd love to." He stood aside, inviting her in. "Let me grab my wallet and we can go out and get something to eat. I know a nice establishment down the street that does an excellent grilled-cheese sandwich."

She showed her amusement with a chuckle and a smile. "Art, you read my mind. It's exactly what I hoped you'd say."

"It must be disappointing for you that I'm already married," he said. "I do have a young Deputy here who might do for you – as a second choice you understand since there's only one of me. I could introduce you."

"Let's not rush it, Art. It might take some time for me to come to terms with my rejection, lower my sights."

She did a good sad voice. Art patted her shoulder, consoling, then took his jacket off the hook and led the way out.

"Tim's down near Somerset with Rachel, won't be back till later this afternoon," he explained when they were on the elevator. "I'm pleased to see you though. I know you were hoping for Tim, but I'd like to talk to you alone and I think you're smart enough that I don't need to explain why." He watched her run her hand up and down the strap on her purse, chewing a lip, and added some humor to lighten her expression again. "Of course, it has nothing to do with me wanting an excuse to avoid finishing my budget numbers this afternoon."

She looked up and smiled to be social. "We can talk, Art, but I'm not sure I'll have anything to say that will help."

"Well, maybe it'll feel good just to talk."

He held the elevator door for her at the lobby and she stepped out, said over her shoulder to him, "That's pretty much what Abe Fischer said last night when he called."

"Tim said he'd been to see him. What'd Abe have to say?"

"Just that he'd never seen Tim shoot so badly. He's worried. He asked me what was bothering him. They went…" Miljana paused and adjusted the sentence, "…_Tim_ went through most of Abe's liquor cabinet last night and then fell asleep in his living room. He showed up this morning at some point. I saw him at breakfast." She continued to talk as they strolled to the diner. "He's been out running _every _night – 2am, 3am – and it's not that that's unusual, it's just an unusual concentration."

Art mulled that over while they got comfortable at a table, wished he could've been party to the phone call between Tim's girl and Tim's shooting buddy – that would've been something.

She added, "When things happen that stir up his memories he can't sleep and then he gets overtired and everything looks worse and affects him more. It can be vicious when it happens but this is the worst I've seen it. I'm glad he's with Rachel. She handles him well."

"Glad because he's so tired or…?" Art was obvious with the fishing – no point trying to pretend with her.

"Sure, yeah, and… It started with the shooting – that man, the MP – and then, I'm sure you're aware, an unfortunate accumulation of events this past week or so. He's feeling very brittle right now, to me anyway." She played with her knife and fork, straightening them on the table. "He's normally so resilient." She slipped her face into a hand on an elbow, let a tear escape and wiped at it impatiently. "Rachel will keep an eye on him." She looked to him for confidence.

He nodded assurance but asked, "Should I be keeping him at his desk where I can keep an eye on him?"

"No, no. I don't think that would help. It would probably make it worse."

"Worse for him, okay I get that, I think, but how about the rest of the world?"

She held his gaze, held his concerns, weighed them, dismissed them with a wry face and a joke, "I'd recommend not pointing a gun at him, but that's any day of the year."

"Well, thank you, my dear, for the head's up." They smiled in collusion. "So what do we do about him then?"

"I don't know. I'm trying to get him to see someone…someone else." She shrugged helplessly. "He tells me it'll be fine. But that worries me, too – this opening a wound again and again and never letting it heal properly… It just scabs over until that scab gets scraped off by the next rough spot in his life."

The waitress brought their food and they found it interesting for a while, but both left most of their lunch on their plate. Art asked for a refill and sipped his coffee thoughtfully.

"You know what really gets me?" she said, looked at him, shook her head, defeated. "You and I, Art, we'll never know. I can figure out the man, at least well enough, but I wish I could get inside the head of the twenty-year-old Tim that's still over there." She waved vaguely east. "Then maybe I'd be able to help more."

Art had nothing to say to that.

They parted on the street and Art returned to work. Nelson was back at his desk.

"Uh, Chief, I went to the address you gave me but no one was there so I thought I'd try again tomorrow morning if that's okay with you?"

Art stopped, sighed, said, "Nelson, stop beating yourself up. Raylan could talk the Pope into converting if he thought it would help him somehow. You're fine."

Nelson beamed, "Yeah, he's a pretty convincing talker."

"Uh-huh." Art left him to it, sat back behind his desk and stared at his budget numbers until they melted together into a blur and a headache.

* * *

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	9. Chapter 9 - Boogie Dark

**Author's Note: ** A friend suggested tackling a typical fanfiction scenario: a cave-in or a broken elevator with two characters stuck together. I got thinking about family road trips...must be summer.

* * *

**On the Cutting Room Floor – Boogie Dark**

"I spy with my little eye something that is…black."

The voice, though it sounded small, completely unthreatening, wanting and perhaps a bit desperate tiptoeing through the utter darkness, still managed to irritate, and Raylan swatted at it.

"Don't start," he grumped, eyelids pressed against the outer bony edges of his eye sockets as he opened them wider trying to see the source of his irritation. All that was there however was blackness, and a sigh falling between them. "I'm not in the mood."

Then a huff of amusement and the small voice again maneuvering carefully through the oppressive silence of nothingness and thousands of tons of rock, "How many Marshals does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"

"Fuck off, Tim."

"Nope. Wrong answer," Tim lobbed back, aiming blindly across the tunnel. "I don't have a fucking clue how many Marshals it'd take, but I'd pay good money to find out right now." He followed up his joke with a chuckle for his efforts. It was a lonesome chuckle.

Raylan rolled his eyes, his imagination conjuring the stupid grin on Tim's face. Of course he couldn't see it but that wouldn't stop it being there and it annoyed him all the same. He felt around for a small pebble and whipped it in the direction of the sniggering. It ricocheted off rock, bounced off rock, landed and rolled on rock.

Tim couldn't pass up the opportunity to annoy Raylan further. "Missed."

"Maybe I wasn't aiming at you."

"Maybe I wasn't talking to you."

It gave Tim an idea though, something to do other than fidget and complain. He felt around on the ground beside him and picked up a handful of small rocks.

"Don't," Raylan warned, listening to the shuffling across from him.

"Don't worry, I'm not aiming at you," said Tim and a pebble bounced off the wall to Raylan's right.

"Tim," another warning.

"Hey, this is like echo-location."

Another ping, closer this time, another warning. _"Tim."_

"You know this really works. I could be a bat," Tim answered cheerfully and the next one hit Raylan's shoulder.

"Tim!"

"Okay," Tim muttered. The sound of pebbles dropping harmlessly to the cave floor signaled a truce.

But then Raylan picked up the thread of an argument they'd started and abandoned an hour earlier. "Next time you try to diffuse a bomb, I'm running the opposite direction from you when you yell _run_, or maybe I'll just start running before you touch the goddamn thing, then with any luck I'll end up on the opposite side of the cave-in from you. Didn't pay any attention in explosives training in the army, did you? Probably too busy thinking up stupid-ass one-liners."

"Raylan, they taught me how to blow shit up, not un-blow shit up. It was just 'stick a wire here and yeehaw.' The finer art of diffusing was left to the bomb squad. You need a PhD in balls and some messed up wiring yourself for that shit."

Raylan didn't respond so Tim added some more detail.

"I did pay attention in improvised munitions training. That was fun. I can tell you the best place to set your explosives to cause maximum casualties in a building, but I'm fucked if I'm one of the assholes _in _the building and don't have an EOD specialist handy."

Raylan shifted himself slightly and wiped at a few rocks under his butt then settled again. "Doesn't strike me as smart to set a bunch of kids loose with bombs and not teach them how to diffuse them."

Now Tim was irritated. "Maybe you want to write SpecOps command and bitch to them. While you're at it, you might want to add advanced medical training to your demands so we can undo bullet wounds as well as bombs." He had one pebble left and whipped it hard across the tunnel. It bounced straight back and skipped across the floor almost to his feet.

"Touchy," said Raylan.

"Next time you get to pick which wire to pull," Tim replied, mulish. "I told you to call Boyd Crowder."

"Boyd Crowder," Raylan repeated the name adding some disdain and astonishment. "I'm a federal US Marshal and you want me to call a known criminal for help?"

"And you haven't before?"

"Only when I had no choice."

Tim screwed up his face and threw out his arms to encompass the entire mess they were currently in. It was lost on Raylan, sitting fifteen feet away in the black and pitch of earth and rock. Tim reverted to words. "Does total goat-fuck not suggest a lack of choice?"

"You said you had experience with explosives."

"I did not," Tim griped. "You said, 'you're the military dude, you deal with it.'"

Raylan decided to be mature. "Arguing is pointless."

Ten minutes passed, ten minutes of light and steady breathing. Eventually Tim started shuffling around.

"What are you doing?" Raylan asked, suspicious.

"Making myself comfortable. I'm gonna nap."

"You're gonna _nap?"_

"Is there something else I should be doing?"

"You're going to nap?" Raylan repeated. "Doesn't this bother you?"

"Yeah, it bothers me, Raylan. I'd rather be home watching a game and drinking a beer. But shit happens and what the hell am I supposed to do about it? I'm not gonna sit here and freak out. It's not like I'm afraid of the dark or anything."

Raylan felt Tim had a point and settled in himself. "So what are you afraid of?"

"Not much in this world. You?"

"Likewise."

Tim lay out on his back and slid an inch one way then the other, trying to get an angle that didn't have a sharp outcropping jabbing upward, gave up finally and made do with the least uncomfortable spot.

"So you're not afraid of much in this world, how 'bout the next?" Raylan asked continuing the line of questioning to pass time.

"I don't buy into Judgment Day. I can't believe God would go all-in on what he knows is a losing hand."

Raylan snorted. "Well, this is a first. I'm going to agree with you about something."

"I'm petrified of reincarnation though. I'd probably come back as a Harlan native as part of some cosmic joke."

"So really, there's nothing you're afraid of."

"What's the point of being afraid?"

"There's absolutely nothing that Tim Gutterson is afraid of?"

A huff and shuffling and Raylan figured Tim was sitting up again.

"What are you afraid of, Raylan?"

"Dying like a pathetic mouse in a blocked up hole," he snarled.

Tim let that one lie – he understood and wouldn't mock honest fear. Fear was contagious, like a virus, often a product of influence more than anything and Raylan had worked among miners.

"I'm afraid of being captured," Tim offered after a pause, trading secrets. "It still gets me if I'm cornered or someone grabs me."

"But this dark doesn't bother you?"

"Nope."

"And heights don't bother you?"

"Nope."

"Spiders?"

"Nope."

"I know snakes don't."

Raylan's tone had changed – more friendly, reaching – and Tim responded to it by reaching back with some honesty. "A tally."

"What?" Raylan couldn't make sense of the word in context.

"I'm afraid of a tally of my bullets, of someone – and it would have to be someone omniscient – setting up a white board like we do in the office when we're tracking a case, and on it they'd put the face of everyone I've ever killed and I'd have to look at it."

"But you already know who's on it."

"No, Raylan, I don't. I know there are bullets of mine out there that found targets that I wasn't even shooting at. That's war, right? And some of those targets that I was aiming at were so far away I never saw their faces. I just know there'd be some on there that I'd be afraid to look at."

"Tim, you can't think about it like that. That's a whole different set of rules out there. Stop judging yourself by some civilian moral code."

Tim gathered up his stock of sarcasm, and it was substantial considering how much he liberally doled out daily on the job, and said, "Gee, Raylan, thanks. I feel so much better about it all now."

Raylan pictured the head tilt that went with it and he surprised himself feeling a bit badly for Tim. He had no other consolation to offer so he shared something of himself. "I'm just afraid of becoming Arlo or maybe being Arlo all along."

"I doubt you'll die in prison, Raylan."

"Well, that's not exactly the point, is it?"

"No."

The silence hummed with regrets. It was as if the rocks were sympathetic or maybe the opposite, a gallery of onlookers muttering condemnation. Raylan miraculously still had his hat and fingered the brim in a circle like a string of prayer beads. Tim slid back to the floor of the tunnel and tried to close his eyes but the blackness behind his eyelids was no relief from the blackness of them wide open.

After a while, Tim sat up again, restless, spoke to break up the humming. "Maybe if I was a Minecraft character I could pickaxe my way out…aw fuck it – with the luck I'm having today I'd run into a mob of creepers or zombies."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You never played that game?"

"What game?"

"Never mind. I keep forgetting you're old."

Raylan huffed and threw a pebble in Tim's direction. It ricocheted off rock, bounced again off rock, landed and rolled on rock.

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	10. Chapter 10 - Shut Up and Color

**Author's Note: **This little oneshot comes across as a bit sexist. It's not meant that way. In my Timverse, he's good at math, as some men are, and it works as a character trait for a sniper. But women are good at math, too (though it seems we're only just going public about it). Math is an art, a science and above all a language. I love math, so much so I took it all through university. I still love it. If you want to have some fun with math, read the book _Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea_ by Charles Seife. He shows you (with just the tiniest bit of flawed algebra) how you can prove that Winston Churchill was a carrot. Now how fun is that!

This is for a guest - a request for some Tim and Nick study hour. It's all fluff and peaches and a bit of math.

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**On the Cutting Room Floor – Shut Up and Color **

Nick slumped back into his chair, dropped his head in defeat. "But why does it get bigger if you're dividing it by a fraction? Fractions mean smaller."

Tim roughed up his face with both hands, growled in frustration, said, "It's complicated. Well, no it's not complicated just funny to try and look at right." He stood up and did a circuit of the table, arrived back at his chair and sat down.

Nick followed him with his eyes the whole way, demanding without speaking.

"Okay," Tim started again. "If you take a pie and divide it into halves, how many pieces do you have?"

"Two."

"Right. So one divided into halves equals two. See?"

Nick's eyebrows furrowed into a deep valley. "No. One divided into two pieces gives you a _half._"

"No, it gives you two halves – _two._ Get it?" Tim nodded encouragement. "One divided into two pieces gives you a half. One divided into halves gives you two pieces."

"I have a pie," Mrs. Brooks said, eavesdropping from the kitchen. "You can use it to demonstrate if it would help."

Tim looked over. "What kind of pie?"

"And what does that matter?"

"Just asking."

"Peach."

"Oh," Tim's face brightened. "Okay. Can we eat it when we're done?"

"No, it's for dessert."

Tim and Nick shared a frown.

"What if it's opposite day?" Nick asked.

"Opposite day?" Mrs. Brooks walked in, hands on her hips, looked to Tim for an explanation. "Is this something to do with the math?"

"No, Ma'am," Tim said.

"No, Grandma, _opposite day_. Everything's backwards. We get to eat dessert _before_ dinner."

"Yeah, opposite day," Tim seconded, catching on and liking the idea. "I'm all for it, especially if it means I get to eat pie now."

"Well, I suppose we could have an opposite day since you two are working so hard on your math," Mrs. Brooks agreed.

"Yay!" Nick punched the air. "I'll get the ice cream."

"Bring a knife," Tim called.

"I'll get the pie." Mrs. Brooks winked at Tim. "And I'll bake you one all for yourself if he passes his math test tomorrow." She patted his head affectionately.

"Shit, that's incentive," said Tim, rubbing his hands together.

"Language, young man." Mrs. Brooks admonished, a smile as she scolded.

"Yes, Ma'am."

Nick came back balancing plates, ice cream, forks, a knife and pie.

"Now we're talking," Tim said, a satisfied grin. "Okay, so if I divide this pie into halves, how many pieces do I have?" He cut the pie down the middle and pointed at each half.

"Two?" Nick replied.

"Oh my God, the kid can count."

"Shut up," Nick grumbled, crossed his arms on the table and dropped his chin on them.

"Now if I divide this pie into two – a piece for me and a piece for you," Tim dished it out as he spoke, "then how much do you get?"

"A half?"

"Wow, you're a math genius."

"Shut up," Nick grumbled a second time.

Tim grinned. "Do you get the difference?"

Nick sat back up – the light bulb clicking on. "Yeah, I get it." A slow smile grew. "It's just the opposite."

"That's right," said Tim. "Now let's eat." He passed Nick a fork and reached for the ice cream.

The voice of authority carried into the dining room from the kitchen. "You'd better not be eating half of that pie, Timothy Gutterson!"

Tim rolled his eyes. "Yes, Ma'am." He slopped his half back into the pie dish, signaled for Nick to do the same. "So, if we divide this pie into quarters, how many pieces do we have?" he asked and sliced it in half again crosswise.

"Four," Nick said with smug confidence.

"That's right," said Tim. "Which means if I divide this pie into four pieces, how much would you get?"

"A quarter!" Nick shouted.

"You are the Einstein of our generation," Tim applauded. "Here's your prize." He moved a piece onto Nick's plate.

"Tim Gutterson, you'd better not be eating a quarter of that pie, either!"

"Fine." Tim huffed and scooped the pieces back. "How about an eighth?" he asked Nick.

"Okay, I guess."

Tim looked into the kitchen where Mrs. Brooks was chopping vegetables. "We'll make up for it with extra ice cream," he whispered.

"Okay." Nick echoed the whisper, a willing accomplice.

"You'd better not have too much ice cream, boys. You'll ruin your supper."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Tim moaned quietly.

"Language, young man!"

"Yes, Ma'am." He rolled his eyes again and Nick sniggered.

They ate their pie quickly, each feeling like they were getting away with something, and Mrs. Brooks whisked the battered remainder into the kitchen and out of reach.

"That's really good pie, Mrs. Brooks," Tim called after her, watching her wistfully, hoping. He wet his lips. "I think it's the best pie I've ever had."

"Flatter all you want. The answer is _no_. You can have another piece after dinner."

He sighed and turned back to his student. "Let's see how you do on the other questions," he said, pointed at Nick's textbook then opened his own to work on his math problems.

"What are you doing?" Nick was almost on top of the table trying to peer into Tim's notes.

"Calculus."

"What's calculus?"

"It's the math of physics, I guess," Tim answered. "I'm learning about how to figure out the rate of change for things, like velocity – plotting slope."

"Why?"

"Well, sometimes you need to know how quickly something gains or loses..." he waved his hands around, "...whatever...like speed or altitude. Or maybe how sharp a curve is at any given point so you know when inertia's gonna take over and throw you outta your turn if you're, say, a race car driver."

Nick sneered, "You're not a race car driver."

"No. It'd be fun though, wouldn't it?" Tim grinned like a kid.

Nick flat-stared back.

"Okay, so maybe you need to work out the volume of an irregularly shaped object with weird curves…like how much water is in a water balloon...stuff like that."

"Why would I need to know how much water is in a water balloon?"

"Well," Tim looked down at his empty pie plate, scraped away at his Sunday afternoon brain trying to come up with an interesting use for calculus, an example that might mean something to a school kid. "Imagine traveling in space and needing to understand how the gravitational well that you're stuck in is going to affect you when you finally break free – how much it's gonna impact your velocity, the tangent of your new route, or maybe you want to know how close you can get to a black hole. It's important to an astronaut."

"Why?"

"You don't want your astronaut to die, do you?"

"I don't know," Nick replied. "Is he a doofus?"

"Is he a _doofus?_ Shit, I don't know. What's that got to do with anything?"

"About as much as calculus."

"Shut up, you doofus."

Rachel walked past at that moment and deposited an open beer on the table and a smack on Tim's head. "Don't say 'shut up.'"

"He said it first." Tim pointed an accusing finger at Nick. "Do _you_ want to help him with his math?" he snarled at her. "I'll leave if you don't like my teaching methods."

"No way, kiddo. This is your area of expertise. I teach him manners, _style_ and how to treat women."

"I know how to treat women," Tim spluttered. "Mostly."

"Tcha." Rachel stopped and turned to face Tim. "Miljana told me what you got her for her birthday." She accented the disdain with a classic pose, hip out, impossibly arched eyebrow, arms firmly crossed.

"Hey! She _asked _for jumper cables."

"Tcha." Rachel repeated, shaking her head in recognition of a lost cause. "You just don't get it."

Tim stared at her, wondering what he didn't get and why calculus did nothing to explain the attraction of curves on a woman or what made them so different from men.

Nick raised his eyebrows, wagged his head smugly. "So, who's the doofus?"

Tim picked up his beer and glared across the table. "Shut up and color."

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	11. Chapter 11 - Angels

**Author's Note: **This is for TellatrixForever, who sent me a request for a 9/11 story...on September 10th. I couldn't get it out there in time for the date, but here it is - a late and humble offering with sincere sympathy for anyone personally touched. Thanks to Red Molly for weapons ideas, my rifle lady, as she suggested and respectfully, I repeat as she suggested.

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**On the Cutting Room Floor – Angels**

It was Tuesday and Tim had booked the day off – personal shit. It was the anniversary of a death and he needed to acknowledge it properly. There were a few deaths, the anniversaries of which were spread throughout the year, that he paid tribute to, and he'd managed, with some creative thinking, some fanciful aligning of stars in his past and their pasts, attributing effects to causes, coincidences to far-fetched associations with other coincidences, to convince himself that each life was lost in a violent act that owed its existence, that stemmed and grew from that single day – September 11, 2001.

He remembered where he was that morning – he was in Basic training, just. The news came in and every sorry Private was ready to take on Al Qaeda right then and there. But there was more training and then more training and then there was Afghanistan and some deaths that seemed a long way removed from the attacks that prompted the invasion. When you only got to look at one stretch of road in one territory in an unfamiliar country it was hard to step back from it and keep an eye on the bigger picture. Didn't mean it didn't exist, just that it was difficult at times to see how your friend bleeding out behind a wall in a dirt and dust village on a patrol that accomplished nothing as far as you could tell could link all the way back through the years and miles and make a difference for the families of the dead on that day. But he wished it would, for his buddy's sake, the one quiet now and being lifted onto the back of a scratched and dented and camouflaged truck. Tim remembered picking up a rifle and setting it unneeded in the back of that truck beside the stretcher.

He stopped and picked up a variety of beer. He chose carefully, keeping count: two Budweisers, a Steel Reserve, Yuengling, Miller, a Samuel Adams, a Dos Equis, and a Guinness for the crazy helo pilot who thought the girls might find him sexier if he drank foreign beer. He set his purchases in the back of his pickup with another bottle, a specialty item that he'd bought the previous week. It had taken him a while to find it – Tim wasn't much of a wine connoisseur. Miljana sourced it for him and he went into a specialty liquor store and paid cash and felt like an imposter walking out with a $30 bottle of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. Miljana explained that Sauvignon Blanc was the name of the grape. He was sure she didn't pronounce it right because she skipped a lot of letters when she said it. But, whatever, it was what he needed. It was on his list.

Miljana had lunch with him, made him laugh for a little talking about her dad giving the tech guy on the phone hell for bad internet service, some guy in India doing support for a company that liked to keep its costs down. Then he noticed that he hadn't rebooted the router after a power blip during a thunderstorm. Her dad was a keener, and intelligent, a doctor, just not too smart about anything technical. At the end of lunch she offered to come with him on his errand, but he declined the kindness, told her not to wait up.

It was early still and Tim drove the back roads up to Fischer's, passed him sitting in an old lawn chair out front of the old house that also served as an office for the shooting range. He had taken a little tiny bit of care in his appearance, Tim could tell looking at him as he turned off the engine and gathered his offerings and walked up to meet his friend. Fischer had shaved and wore a better shirt buttoned up and his jeans looked clean.

"Hey." Tim smiled and raised his eyebrows. "Did you comb your hair?"

What was left of the silvery bristles on his head shone in the sunlight.

"Did you get it?"

Not even a glare for the hair comment.

Tim lifted the bottle of wine from the bag. "Milja has contacts."

"So this is how you pay your respects, huh? I probably could've guessed."

"It's what I do. I couldn't…" Tim stopped short of the gravel walkway, looked at the ground. "I don't have it in me to do one of these on every anniversary."

"Firesale."

"So to speak. You up for this?"

"I don't think she'd mind. In fact, I think she'd laugh."

Tim grinned and felt sad despite it. "If she's anything like you."

Fischer pushed up from the chair and looked every one of his sixty-some years today. He slapped Tim on the back and followed him up the hill to the trailer and they each picked the rifle they liked best – Tim, the Barrett, the M82A1; Fischer put together his favorite, his Remington bolt-action, as old as he was.

They wandered companionably up the range and set up their targets, then back to the line and settled in. Tim went first, lined up a Bud and shattered it with a bullet.

"I don't think I'll ever get over losing Pete that way," he said. "He knew me better than anyone should ever have to know anyone."

"Especially someone as obnoxious as you." Fischer lined up a Miller, took two shots but the second one hit its mark and the bottle exploded. "And that's for that fucking idiot Marine who couldn't last the one fucking month he needed to get the hell out of his last tour and home. Fucking asshole. I hate him."

"Should've been you," Tim commiserated.

"Damn fucking straight," Fischer choked out.

Tim sent the Guinness to heaven next. Fischer whooped watching the foam.

"Who was that for?" he asked.

"Craziest helo pilot that ever lived…and died." Tim stretched his face madly to encompass the grin and the sorrow together. "Stupid fucker got us out of a tight spot and had a bottle to share when we got back. I'll never forget him."

They worked their way through the beer, cans and bottles, said a line in memory, until the only target left was the Sauvignon Blanc.

Fischer chambered another round, looked down the scope. Tim waited respectfully. It seemed a long time passed.

"I can't do it."

"Sure you can."

"She was so excited to get that job."

Tim listened.

"I told her I'd come visit at Thanksgiving. I fucking hate cities. I knew I'd fucking hate New York. She was so excited. Big tower. Big job. Big city." Fischer wiped a hand across his eyes. "You'd better do this."

"She wasn't my daughter, man."

"I hate this day."

Tim nodded. "You want me to do it?"

"Yeah."

Tim lined up the $30 bottle of Sauvignon Blanc and sent it to oblivion.

Fischer watched, his head bobbing in appreciation. "Thank you. I like your tradition."

"It works for me. Did you get the bourbon?"

"I did."

"Well, let's go finish it then."

The two men lay in the dirt and grass silently for a little longer. Tim glanced over after a bit, solicitous. "You okay?"

"Yeah, yeah. It was a while ago."

"That don't make it easier. That don't bring her back."

"No, it don't."

The older man sat up first, broke down his rifle. He took off the scope and held it reverently, thinking, then handed it to Tim. "It's yours," he said. "I always intended to pass it on to my daughter and hoped maybe she'd take up shooting again, but…" He squeezed his whole face shut. "You should have it."

"Abe…"

"No, really. It's exactly what I want."

Tim was up on his knees too, reached over and took the offering. Accepted. "Thank you. You know I'll appreciate it."

Abe nodded. "That's a …"

"I know. It's a Pecar Berlin Light-Gathering Scope. Don't think I don't appreciate its worth, old man. Thank you."

Abe nodded again. "I want you to have it."

Tim didn't have anything else to say.

"Now we get to destroy that bottle of bourbon, right?"

"That's the routine," said Tim.

"It's a good routine. Can we do it again next year?"

"If your liver holds out."

"Mine's fine. Are you wimping out, pussy?"

"Fuck you."

"Fuck you, too."

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